In my opinion, this is indeed a very important question, considering the stated goals of this forum. Many people here take pride in being "rationalists" who are supposedly head and shoulders above the common folk when it comes to eliminating biases and popular delusions. Yet if they are nevertheless afraid to touch topics like politics where these biases and delusions are particularly severe and widespread, or worse, if discussions of such topics here tend to display the same problems as elsewhere, one must ask -- what good is all this "rationality" then? It's as if there was a weightlifting club whose members had an agreement not to touch weights over, say, fifty kilos. (In fact, even worse -- these people would at least know for sure they can handle up to 50kg weights, whereas if your biases are too strong to think about political topics rationally, how can you be confident that you're better than average in other areas?)
Now of course, posts and comments that talk about politics in the usual way full of biases, delusions, and strong emotions should be downvoted and discouraged, but only to the extent that, for example, people commenting about physics with stubborn ignorance and incorrigible inaccuracy get treated similarly. In other words, what should be targeted are errors of logic and fact as such, not the topic at hand in which they are committed. To some extent, this is indeed what happens, and it's one feature of this forum that I really like. I have made many comments here about politically and ideologically sensitive topics, and most of them have been well received in terms of upvotes and responses.
One question I find fascinating is what exactly determines the range of sensitive topics that tend to break down the discourse even on LW (and which is, in my observations, quite different from most other venues). Maybe one day I'll post a compendium of my conclusions about this.
Yet if they are nevertheless afraid to touch topics like politics where these biases and delusions are particularly severe and widespread, or worse, if discussions of such topics here tend to display the same problems as elsewhere, one must ask -- what good is all this "rationality" then?
Delusions that are truly widely held and not merely believed to be widely held are far too dangerous to attack. There are sociopolitical Eldritch Abominations that it would serve LW well to stay well clear of and perhaps even pretend they don't exist for the t...
There is a tendency to downvote articles and commentaries with a political subtext with a remark on how politics is the mind-killer. I completely understand that nobody wants his mind to be killed, however, I disagree on the employed methods. I don't think anybody can really afford to ignore politics. It's a fact about any group of even a handful of people. Thus instead of shunning politics I think it's better to build one's rational defenses. Understanding that politics is a problem is only the first step. If you stop there, there will always be a big part of life where you are not rational. Therefore I suggest that, as long as it doesn't get out of hands, there should always be room for political discussions if not on the main site at least in the discussion section.